Dr Giggles **½ (1992, Larry Drake, Holly Marie Combs, Cliff De Young) – Classic Movie Review 3482

Co-writer/director Manny Coto’s deeply unsettling 1992 horror movie stars Larry Drake as the psychopathic Dr Evan Rendell, aka Dr Giggles, the son of a mass-murdering doctor, who escapes from his mental institution and comes to the town where his crazy father was murdered and goes on the rampage, slaughtering teens with a selection of medical equipment. He becomes infatuated with a teenage girl who has a heart condition, and so his goal becomes to give her a heart transplant.

Coto’s nightmarish stalk-and-slash horror flick, which went straight to video in the UK, is interesting but standard par-for-the-course stuff of the era.

It’s a pity that you can see so many of the shocks coming, but director Coto lifts it slightly out of the rut with a sure hold on the darkly comic tone, some strong set pieces and knowing movie reference nods to the vintage Thirties mad doctor films and to Vincent Price’s Dr Phibes character. It gets off to a very nice start with a computerised journey and there’s a score by Brian May to relish.

Drake makes a useful baddie, just as he did in Darkman, enjoying himself miles away from his sweet-natured, simple-minded LA Law character of Benny.

Of course it goes without saying that naturally, or unnaturally, it is unhealthy stuff.

Larry Drake died on 17 March 2016, aged 67.

© Derek Winnert 2016 Classic Movie Review 3482

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